


WingDing Nightmare

by FollowerofMercy



Category: Undertale (Video Game)
Genre: Angry Parent, Asgore Needs a Hug, Author's idea of mild may be different than yours, Bad Puns, Bilingual Character(s), Bitter Old Men, Body Horror, Car Accidents, Character Death, Coping, Established Alphys/Undyne, Everyone Needs A Hug, Explicit Language, F/F, F/M, Gaster Needs a Hug, Good W. D. Gaster, Gore, Grief/Mourning, Grumpy Old Men, Hurt, Hurt/Comfort, I can't decide whether this is Mature or Explicit, I'm working on this I swear, It hits rock bottom pretty fast, Mild Gore, Minor Sans/Toriel, Minor Soriel, Mostly Gen, Nightmares, No Smut, Not Happy, Not a Love Story, POV Third Person, POV W. D. Gaster, Parent W. D. Gaster, Post-accident W. D. Gaster, Puns & Word Play, Rated M for a lot of things, Sans Doesn't Remember Resets, Skeleton W. D. Gaster, Suicide, Suicide Attempt, Toriel needs a hug, Undertale Monsters on the Surface, Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms, Vanilla Undertale, Very Minor Soriel, Wingdings is also verbal gibberish, Wingdings is like sign language, just a lot of hurt, mild body horror
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-01-13
Updated: 2018-03-18
Packaged: 2019-03-04 05:59:24
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 5
Words: 18,898
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13358001
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FollowerofMercy/pseuds/FollowerofMercy
Summary: Dr. W. D. Gaster, dadster extraordinaire, is back and living happily on the surface with his sons, until there's a very mundane accident. Just the story of a grieving parent.This is not a happy story and never will be, though there's no pain for pain's sake.- Update as of Sept 1, 2018: currently on hiatus. I have a few more projects that I'd rather work on. I'm not abandoning this and if you want to talk about it, hit me up on Tumblr. Otherwise, I'm not working on this for awhile.





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> This was supposed to be an alternate scenario for another long thing I'm writing, but I have so many stories half-started that I just needed to put SOMETHING out there. For this story, it's post-pacificst run, monsters and humans are getting along great, Gaster and the followers were rescued from the void by Frisk, Alphys and the skelebros and Gaster is a dadster. There's established and serious Alphys/Undyne that is important to the story and Soriel mentions that don't play a major part at all. Tags will be updated as more of the story gets written.

Dr. Wingdings Gaster, founder and head of the applied magic research division at the local university, teased the mechanism before him as if it were a bomb. He hardly dared to breath as he fidgeted with the key, the tumblers of the lock clunking louder than he would’ve liked. He winced at the sound and pressed his skull to the door of the apartment, straining for any sounds of the two men within. He only had one chance to get this right.

Once satisfied that the occupants were oblivious to his presence, Gaster nudged his toolbox and briefcase to the side and straightened his tie. A grin crept over his ruined face in anticipation, even as he took a deep breath to steady himself.

He kicked the door in. It rebounded off of the wall, the crash drowned out by his war cry.

“ **COME TO PAPA**!”

An excited squeal sounded deep within the apartment, rising in pitch as a screeching Papyrus tore through the kitchen and leapt over the coffee table. Gaster stepped forward into his son’s bear hug, his spine popping as Papyrus lifted him clear off the ground.

“DADDY! I MISSED YOU! WELCOME HOME!”

Gaster thumped him on the back and growled, his feet pedaling for purchase in the air. “Rrraaaagh, I missed you too! How’s my favorite son?”

Papyrus pulled back a bit to give him a disappointed glare, though without much feeling. “SANS IS RIGHT THERE, DAD.”

Sure enough, Sans was feigning sleep face down on the couch.

“So he is,” Gaster muttered. He flapped a hand dismissively, still suspended in Papyrus’s arms.

“Eh, he knows I love him.” Truthfully, he loved both his boys equally. It was just a lot of fun to mess with them.

“YOU SHOULD TELL HIM THAT DIRECTLY! IT IS GOOD FOR FAMILY BONDING!”

“Only if I can be obnoxious about it,” Gaster responded.

“OF COURSE!” Papyrus slung his father over his shoulder and retrieved his bags with his free hand. “HOW ELSE DO YOU DO ANYTHING?”

Their voices echoed throughout the halls of the trashy apartment complex. Well, they chose the human college flop complex for a reason. Between Gaster’s drunken rants and Papyrus’s natural volume, they’d be evicted from any reputable location.

Gaster gasped in mock injury, crossing his arms and gently elbowing Papyrus in the back of the skull. “Rude!”

Papyrus NYEH’d and carried Gaster back into the apartment, depositing his tools on the kitchen table. Gaster wriggled off his shoulder and smoothed his suit before snatching him up from behind in his own back-breaking hug. Papyrus windmilled his arms as Gaster lifted him and whispered into his ear.

“What is it that Undyne does? A… ‘flattery suplex’?”

“NYO HO HO NO!” Papyrus squealed, flailing to get away. Gaster raised him a little higher, laughing at his shrieks. There was no way he would _actually_ suplex his son, least of which that he’d snap his own spine trying, but he could pretend.

Gaster growled into the back of Papyrus’s shirt, careful to avoid flying fists and elbows. “I love you so much!”

“I LOVE YOU TOO! NOW PUT ME DOWN!”

Gaster obliged. As soon as his feet touched the floor, Papyrus raced to put the kitchen table between them. He eyed his father with exaggerated suspicion and hunkered in a battle stance, but Gaster was done messing with him. Instead, he leaned over the table and beckoned Papyrus closer so he could murmur in his ear. “Let’s go annoy your brother. I’ve been home a full five minutes and he’s still sleeping.”

\---

Sans grinned into the couch cushions as his family screamed in the kitchen. Home life had somehow gotten even louder with their dad back, and sometimes that made it hard to sleep, but it was a willing sacrifice to be together again. Gaster’d been home for months, and still Sans never got tired of hearing him and Papyrus get the relationship they always wanted.

Sans’s happiness warped into a looming sense of dread when their voices dropped. A quiet Papyrus was never a good sign, _especially_ with Dad in the room. He heard cackling, which was quickly shushed, and his fears were confirmed. He tucked his head in his arms and resigned himself to the horrors to follow.

He didn’t even hear them until it was too late.

\---

Both tall skeletons vaulted over the back of the couch and slammed onto either side of Sans, catapulting him into the air. He didn’t react as he soared, though a strange whistling groan escaped when Gaster tackled him midair and squeezed.

They fell in a pile of tangled limbs, Gaster squishing Sans and lavishing him with kisses. “Oh, my darling son,” he cooed, teeth clicking on San’s skull. “I loooooove you so much!”

He rubbed his face against Sans’s cheek, who winced at the grind of bone on bone but otherwise endured the abuse impassively. “hey dad.”

Papyrus sat primly at the other end of the couch, hands clasped in his lap and a shit-eating grin plastered on his face. Sans glared at him from under the assault. “your idea?”

Papyrus nodded, pleased with himself, as Gaster extracted himself from his son and wiped off his mouth. Sans did the same, sitting upright and scrubbing his face with his filthy sleeve. “How’s my boy?” Gaster asked once all cooties had been removed.

“i _was_ having a nice nap.”

“Was,” Gaster clarified. Sans grunted, leaned against his dad and closed his eyes. Papyrus scooted over until they were one big skeleton pile and wrapped his arms around all of them.

“uh-huh. so, how’s the lab? we good for monday's inspection?”

“Absolutely!” Gaster rattled off every test he had run, every piece of equipment that he had checked. Sans nodded along with him, double checking his work as he spoke. Humans ran things very differently than Asgore had, thank God, and there were a lot more things to keep track of.

Especially safety regulations.

They, mostly Gaster, had an adjustment period after being welcomed to the surface and starting their new careers. Papyrus helped at the clinic. Sans worked odd jobs with no rhyme or reason, occasionally popping in to help his dad, while Gaster worked to unite magic and technology. Working under others was… an experience, but things were going well! Gaster could fake professionalism better than anyone, and Sans helped diffuse any situations before they could become a problem.

Gaster finished his report, and the group went to make breakfast. Papyrus’s cooking had improved considerably with Toriel’s help, though the others hovered to ensure nothing burned and no spices got mixed up. Nobody wanted a repeat of the butterscotch-cumin pie. Papyrus didn’t mind their lack of faith, or perhaps didn’t notice.

He was making macaroni and cheese grits. Gaster wasn’t even sure what grits were, and macaroni didn’t strike him as breakfast food, but whatever.

“FATHER! I NEED TWO CUPS OF MILK! SANS, FETCH THE TACO CHEESE!”

The other skeletons followed his orders as he bustled around the kitchen, Gaster making note of their dwindling milk supply. Soon, they gathered around and stared at a warming pot of water, willing it to boil faster. Papyrus rocked on his heels, Gaster spaced out and Sans reveled in the calm.

\---

It wasn’t to last. Papyrus’s voice soon shattered the silence.

“SO!”

Gaster and Sans snapped to attention – well, Sans opened his eyes – but Papyrus just stared at them expectantly, vibrating in place.

“…Yes?”

“I DON’T KNOW, IT SEEMED QUIET! WE SHOULD CONVERSE!”

“how was the gym with undyne?” Sans asked, despite already being filled in earlier that day.

“OH, IT WAS LOVELY! WE DID WEIGHT TRAINING, AND WITH THIS DELICIOUS AND NUTRICIOUS MEAL, I SHALL SOON HAVE THE RIPPLING MUSCLES TO COMPLIMENT MY STUNNING STATURE!”

Gaster chuckled and looked to Sans for a cue, but he seemed nonplussed by Papyrus’s idea of anatomy. He was joking… right? Skeletons didn’t have muscles. It was a bit of a defining trait of their race. Gaster hadn’t been in this plane of existence long enough to learn his adult son’s quirks, so he couldn’t tell whether he was completely serious, but Papyrus’s perception of reality had always been… different, as a child. Not necessarily wrong, just different.

Whatever. Denial was the Gaster family superpower. The void said he was dead, that he’d never see his boys again, and look at him now! What right did he have to dampen his son’s enthusiasm?

“ _abs_ olutely,” Sans replied.

Papyrus NYEH’d, smiled, then abruptly stiffened. Sans grinned wider than usual as disappointment dawned on his brother’s face.

Papyrus whipped around to berate him, wagging a spoon and accidentally flipping an uncooked elbow of macaroni into his brother’s eyesocket. His jaw dropped and conjured eyeballs bugged out of his head.

“ow,” Sans deadpanned.

“SANS OHMYGOD I’M SO SORRY!!!” Papyrus tossed the spoon into the warm water and started digging inside his brother’s skull for the piece of pasta. Sans let him, his sockets going dark as Papyrus wedged his hand inside.

“’s fine, bro.” He tilted his skull to look at his father, standing nonchalant behind Papyrus. Personal space didn’t exist in this family. “by the way, tori’s bringing frisk over later.”

“Is everything alright?” Gaster asked.

“yeah, frisk just – ow – misses their grandpa, ya friggen shut-in.”

Gaster grinned so wide it hurt. Papyrus retrieved the macaroni and carefully extracted his fist from Sans’s skull, giving him a pat on the head once satisfied that he was ok and returned to the almost-boiling water. 

“That’s wonderful! Do they call you Dad yet?”

“nope, that’s asgore. i'm dunkle, dunkle sans. it’s either dad-uncle or dunking uncle.”

“AND I’M EITHER UNCLE PAPYRUS OR OTHER MOM!”

“Poor Frisk,” Gaster muttered, jumping on another chance to tease his son. “Not only do they live in a broken home, but their dunkle is dating their mother, who is old enough to be **MY** grandmother!”

Sans rolled his eyelights. “you’re not going to stop giving me crap about that, are you?”

“Nope.”

Sans shuffled past him to get the grits for Papyrus, pushing the colander out of the way. “don’t _strain_ yourself, g-man.”

Gaster sneered and followed him around his brother, hands clasped behind his back and looming over his short son. “I mean, I knew Toriel loves young people, but I never expected her to stoop to _cradle robbing._ ”

“keep makin’ fun of me, and frisk’ll have to stoop to _grave robbing_ to see you,” Sans said and smiled sweetly, his sockets dead and empty. Gaster hopped back and held his hands in a placating gesture, still grinning.

“Relax, I’m just _ribbing_ you.”

“OH MY GOD YOU TWO. STOP.” Papyrus slammed the instant grits and macaroni into the boiling pot, unflinching in the face of the resultant splash. The boys snickered and huddled behind him, making idle conversation as “breakfast” cooked. Soon, they spooned the meal into bowls and settled on the couch.

It was edible, though perhaps Sans had the right idea drowning it in ketchup. Gaster nibbled on his grits, whose texture lived up to their name, as Papyrus regaled them with tales of the nice humans he had met that morning. There was a Johnathan that whistled at Undyne, who Papyrus had to rescue and turned out to be very nice, and a Ms. Henry who was very sad and they tried to cheer up, and a dozen others. Papyrus’s unending enthusiasm made Gaster feel guilty for forgetting intern’s names.

Once finished eating, Sans snuggled into his hoodie in the corner of the couch and texted Toriel while Gaster and Papyrus took the dishes to the sink.

“Papyrus, can I ask a favor?” Gaster asked once everything was soaking.

“OF COURSE, FATHER! WHAT DO YOU NEED?”

“IF you go out today, can you pick up milk, booze and coffee?”

Papyrus clapped his hands in anticipation of driving. “I’LL GET RIGHT ON IT! SANS! PUT SHOES ON!”

Gaster sighed as his son raced out of the room. “Papyrus, I said ‘IF’! You don’t have to – ugh.”

He heard them arguing in the other room.

“why do I have to go?”

“BECAUSE I DON’T KNOW WHAT KIND OF ALCOHOL YOU TWO HOOLIGANS LIKE! NOW GET UP, LAZYBONES, AND GET DRESSED!”

“ok, fine, I’ll meet you there.”

“OH NO YOU DON’T, WE’RE GOING TO DO SOME BROTHERLY BONDING! YOU’RE RIDING WITH ME!”

“can I bring my trombone?”

“UM… OK?! SURE? WHY NOT?”

Sans poked his head in the kitchen. “yo, dad, still have your harmonica?”

“…Yes, why?”

“wanna join us on the bandwagon?”

“STOP TRYING TO SET UP JOKES AND GET DRESSED!”

Sans snickered and plopped back on the couch, slipping on sneakers left under the coffee table while Papyrus rooted around in his own room. Gaster leaned over the back and looked at Sans’s phone.

“I can’t believe my son is a furry,” Gaster muttered at the wall of texts from Toriel. Sans tapped out a message and hit send without looking at the phone, his skull tilted back to look at his father.

“it’s not my fault the only woman that appreciates my humor is a goat.”

“She seems more like a _cougar_ to me.”

“ayyyyy, **no** ,” Sans said and flashed finger guns at him, his eye sockets going dark at the end.

Gaster leaned down and booped him on the nose with a sharp clack, face carefully neutral. “You know that doesn’t scare me.”

They stared at each other for a moment, sizing each other up, before Sans grinned and snapped his finger guns. “you’re lyin’!”

“Whatever!” Gaster waved him off. “I WANT GRANDBABIES!”

Sans shrugged. “shouldn’t we, ya know, get married first?”

He realized what he said and yanked his hood down.

“OOOOOOOHHHHH!” Gaster crowed, steamrolling over his son’s protests.

“i’m not proposing! jesus christ dad, we haven’t been dating that long calm down!”

The noise summoned Papyrus, strutting out of his room in a stylish neon crop top and torn jeans. He swooped under his father to rescue his brother and hoisted Sans over his shoulder. Sans glared daggers from his perch as Papyrus carried him to the door.

“WE’LL BE BACK SOON, DAD!”

Gaster leaned against the couch and waved. “Alright, be safe! And Papyrus?”

He turned around. “NYES?”

“Meet some nice skeleton girls while you’re out! I want grandchildren and you’re my only hope. You know, since your brother is a huge disappointment.”

Sans reached around to flip his father off, though his smile was genuine. "i'm not huge, i'm big-boned."

Papyrus rolled his... sockets, and saluted with his free hand. “I WON’T LET YOU DOWN! NOW, ONWARD BROTHER!”

He spun on his heel and leapt out of the apartment, leaving Gaster waving goodbye as the door slammed.

\---

Gaster slumped and frowned once they were gone. He preferred solitude to other people, but preferred his boys above all else. He shrugged off the melancholy and curled on the couch with one of Sans’s physics textbooks. He could entertain himself for a few hours without them. Papyrus would probably get distracted and drive in to every little shop he found, so Gaster settled in for an afternoon alone.

\---

Around noon, Gaster heard a knock at the door. Expecting Toriel and Frisk, he threw the door open with a big smile.

He was not expecting the two human police officers, and his cheerful greeting died in his throat. “…Can I help you?”

“Are you Mr. Gaster?” The lead officer looked sheepish, staring at a point to the left of Gaster’s head.

“It’s doctor, and yes I am.” Gaster towered over both of them, though he tried not to loom or otherwise appear threatening. They seemed skittish enough and it was affecting his inner calm.

One officer stood silent behind the other and made eye contact with Gaster, his face full of pity. Gaster didn’t like that expression, so he turned his attention to the woman that had spoken. The lead officer’s eyes flicked over to meet his before darting away, this time staring to his right. “Are you related to a Sans and Papyrus?”

“Yes, they’re my sons.” The quiet officer winced and the woman took a deep breath to collect herself, then gave Gaster the dignity of her full attention.

“Sir, you should sit down. May we come in?”

At that ominous suggestion, Gaster took advantage of his height, his bones sparking with nervous energy. “What’s wrong? What happened? Did Papyrus forget his driver’s license again?”

“No, sir,” the silent officer said. He had a soft, slow, and currently irritating voice.

_Then spit it out,_ Gaster flicked in wingdings, the gestures easily mistaken for nervous fidgeting. He felt sick, like his body understood better than his mind.

“There was an accident,” the woman said at length, once Gaster made no move to leave the doorway.

Gaster blinked as his thoughts ground to a halt. “Yes, and?”

“Paramedics rushed to the scene, but… they were too late.”

“Ok. And?” Gaster thought it was impossible for the two officers to look any more uncomfortable. He was wrong, but he didn’t care.

“Sir, your sons didn’t make it.”

After a moment without comprehension, his eyelights winked out and his neutral grin gaped on his face. To the officer’s credit, they only flinched a little at the wingdings. “… **Ha… You’re joking, right?”**

“…You’re joking,” he repeated in normal speech, his voice saccharine.

The woman took a half step forward. She had very pretty blonde hair, Gaster thought. Like sweet honeysuckle. Or rancid, putrefying fat.

“Dr. Gaster, I’m so sorry.” She held her hand out for him to take if he wanted, but not so far as to crowd him. Gaster twitched away but disguised the reflex by clapping his hands together cheerily, his smile growing unnaturally wide.

“No, no, I’m fine. Where did this happen?”

“Sir, it’s probably best if you stay – “

His smile was seriously aggravating the crack in his jaw. It was a nice sensation, a distraction from the numbness spreading throughout his body. “I need to get their dust.”

“I’m sorry, what?” she asked.

“Their dust. You know, _their dust. The stuff we bury._ ” He didn’t intend to be so sharp, though he also didn’t intend to smile. It just happened.

“Oh of course, sir, it’s currently being held at the hospital. I have the address – “ she pulled out a neatly folded notecard. “ – Here, with a phone number.”

Gaster plucked in out of her hand, scanned it and shoved it into his pocket, then started to close the door.

“Thank you very much have a nice day!”

“Um, sir? Sir!” The soft-spoken officer stepped forward and together they propped the door open, though not forcefully. They exchanged uncomfortable pleasantries for a bit longer, Gaster watching them with hollow sockets as they explained what had happened.

It was the other driver’s fault, a T-bone – Ha! – accident. Sans was likely killed on impact, and Papyrus was half dust by the time the human paramedics arrived. Apparently, he had been comforting the other driver, telling her that it’d be ok, that he forgave her, that it was just a mistake. Typical Papyrus.

Now wasn’t that just hilarious? Spend all that time watching them be playthings of the psychotic flower only to get their happy ending, and then there be a silly little accident like this?

\---

“Sir, you’re in shock,” one of the officers said.

“No shit?” He wasn’t sure if he thought it, said it or signed it, and really didn’t care.

He started laughing at some point, and never thought he would stop.

\---

Gaster didn’t remember much of the next few hours. Somehow Toriel found out. He might have walked over there once he convinced the police he wasn’t crazy, or maybe they found her and told her. He definitely didn’t call her, since finding out about death was somehow rude when you could hang up and get away from the ugly truth. Then Undyne found out, and Alphys, and a bunch of other people.

He distinctly remembered going to the hospital to get the dust, though. The driver called him on the way there, apparently being kept overnight for monitoring. She had found his information online and was accepting visitors.

As if he needed her permission.

He wasn’t sure what he was expecting, but it was just some woman, not paying attention on her way home from work. She cried as soon as she saw him. Sobbed, really, and stumbled over apologies. Maybe she recognized the similarities between him and Papyrus, or maybe she just assumed that all skeletons were related or something.

Either way, Gaster didn’t have much to say to her. If she had’ve been drunk, or high or texting or, or _something,_ he could’ve justified an emotional reaction. This? This was an accident. A stupid, pointless accident with nobody to blame.

Funny, she cried more than he did.

\---

Everyone cried more than he did over the next few days. He made preparations for the funeral and called to check up on everyone else, mechanically returning their hugs and well-wishes. Toriel and Asgore checked on him a lot. He vaguely felt he should appreciate it, but instead focused on his work.

He had designed a little way to get back at the world, a plan they wouldn’t like, and he was determined to see it through.


	2. Shower Scene

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which the suicide warning tags become relevant.

Dr. Gaster was nothing if not thorough.

After the shock of his sons’ deaths wore off, he made a plan. He sifted through San’s notes and transcribed them, rewriting the instructions clear enough for others to follow. He finished the projects that were almost complete and sent them out for publishing. He scratched his own name out of his unfinished papers and replaced them with Sans’s, even if he had barely helped. Nobody was left to argue otherwise.

Gaster already had a reputation. His boys were too young to get their own.

It was a good deflection for all of the questions. “I’ll be ok,” he said. “Work helps.” Whatever he had to say to get them off of his back. Thankfully the others were too busy grieving, clinging to each other and sobbing, to notice anything amiss.

Slowly, he gave things away. The boys’ belongings were distributed among friends, Gaster lying when he said he had enough to remember them by. Papyrus’s collections were huge hits with the local children, and Gaster made sure they cherished every last toy. His own work was passed around the lab, his human coworkers too careful with his feelings to object and concerned by his apparent lack of grief. Bit by bit, his apartment grew barren. Every little thing was dismantled or gifted, an old habit from scrounging in the Underground.

Toriel came by one day to check on him. Gaster didn’t bother answering the door.

She’d understand.

Soon, after many sleepless nights, there was nothing left to give and no more papers to finish. Gaster scribbled out a note with a steady hand and set it on the coffee table, the only piece of furniture remaining except for the couch. He padded through the empty apartment, into the bathroom, as calm and collected as ever.

He took off his jacket and shirt and folded them neatly on the counter. He turned the shower on low, enough flow to get the job done, but not so much as to be overly wasteful. He had already set for the water to be turned off tomorrow, as well as the utilities. Everything was accounted for.

He started to unbutton his pants, but hesitated. For some reason, he wanted to die with his pants on and keep a shred of dignity after all that had happened.

He frowned at the thought. Somebody would have to come by and deal with the dusty slacks, and this whole plan had been to disappear as conveniently as possible. He tapped his foot before he shrugged and got in the shower with his pants. It was a little selfish, but then again, he considered himself a selfish person. Why change now?

He adjusted the showerhead until it splashed on the far wall, so the current would sweep away the dust, and summoned a small blaster. It still took up most of the shower, forcing Gaster to lean against the wall to make room. Water flowed down onto his spine and splashed on his forehead.

He swiveled the blaster so he was looking down the barrel of its jaws and stared into its empty sockets. A white light flickered at its throat, weak and sputtering, before growing into a steady, pulsing beacon. Gaster watched the magic build, transfixed by the brightening glow, and trembled. He hugged himself to stop the tremors. _Shivers from the cold water_ , he told himself.

_There’s nothing left for you here._ He shakily pushed more magic into the blaster, which started to whine in anticipation.

_There’s no point living in a world without them._ Gaster ground his teeth and braced himself, mentally and physically.

The light flickered in response.

_I_ **won’t** _live in a world without them._

Magic buzzed in his joints and thrummed in the air around the blaster, slowing down the world around him. Water spattered off of the monstrous dog skull and dribbled down the sides of the shower. His own breathing had stopped and he stared, small, huddled and washed out, into the mouth of his cannon. The tension hurt.

Gaster tried to make it fire. He tried and shivered, trying to convince himself. _It’s too late to go back. I cancelled the lease, I said goodbye, I finished everything._ Still, the blaster didn’t fire. He had spent too long clinging to life, and his body rebelled against him now. Despite his thoughts and half-hearted commands, the burn of magic guttered out, leaving an empty skull.

After a few panicked, relieved moments, Gaster moaned in frustration and dug at his sockets, then grabbed the blaster’s jaws and opened them wide. He stuck his head and as much of his torso as would fit into its maw.

_I can do this! It’ll be painless!_ He pictured it firing, or snapping shut, or anything to take him out of this awful, empty, childless world. _This should be easy,_ he thought and willed the blaster to finish him. His internal commands grew more frantic, his justifications more obscure. _Please, please! Just fire! Please?_

_I have to do this…I have to…_ The skull just floated there, supporting him when his arms gave out and he collapsed in its useless jaws.

He cried for the first time since his sons died.

Gaster thunked his head on the roof of the blaster’s mouth, trapped in hell once again. The hitching in his breath was barely audible over the sound of the water. 

His crying soon turned to snarling.

He thrashed and screamed, slamming his head into his blaster hard enough to send himself reeling. He dragged the blaster down when he slipped, caught in a snaggle of teeth and bone, and landed hard. Gaster yanked himself free, the serrations cutting into his collarbone and arms, and started beating his creation’s muzzle. He couldn’t protect his family, he couldn’t help his king, a fucking _child_ had brought them to the surface, and now he _couldn’t even kill himself properly_!

His knuckles cracked under the abuse and his voice gave out, strangled by emotion and weak from months of disuse. His blaster just floated there, taking his punches and incoherent insults without judgement or feeling. He screamed himself raw, shirtless, shaking and soaking wet.

Weeks of working without sleep or proper food had left him drained. He tired quickly and his blaster dissolved in a flurry of spent magic. He curled on himself when his support dropped away, defeated, and panted into his knees as the dust settled. Not his dust, unfortunately. Numbness spread from his mind to his soul, and on to the rest of his body.

He sat there for a long, long time.

He wasn’t thinking, or seeing, or feeling. The gravity of what he had tried to do hadn’t settled in, instead sliding off of his consciousness like the water dripping down his face. The only thing that roused him was the eventual ring of the doorbell.

Gaster raised his head in confusion. He considered just waiting for them to leave, maybe work up the energy for another attempt, but his curiosity won out. _Curiosity,_ he told himself. He forced himself to his feet, squeezed most of the water from his slacks and didn’t bother with a shirt.

*

Alphys wrung her hands at the door. She shouldn’t be nosy and it wasn’t like she was close with the doctor but he was Sans’s dad and he had been a pretty good friend, right? She owed it to check up on him, like Sans did with the amalgamates. Like Papyrus did over Undernet. Gaster was tall and scary (and kinda cute in a weird, intimidating way), but somehow he raised those two boys. How bad could he really be?

She squeaked when the door opened, a dripping Gaster glaring down at her.

Oh, he looked bad. Very, very bad. That was the same creepy face Sans used to do and it was so much scarier at twice her height. “I-I… u-uuuhh… hi. How’re you?”

Smooth.

Gaster squinted as her voice trailed off, inclining his head to hear her better. Both of his boys used to do the head-cocking thing, but she always assumed they picked it up from the Snowdin dogs. Apparently, she was wrong.

His eyelights returned, though faint and unfocused, and his rigid grin softened into a confused frown.

“Alphys?”

She tried really, really hard not to wince at his voice. It had never been “smooth,” exactly, but the poor mon’s voice was as cracked as his face.

“H-hi,” she repeated stupidly. She registered that he… wasn’t wearing a shirt. Or shoes. And his pants were soaking wet. But most importantly he wasn’t wearing a shirt.

She froze on seeing the extent of his scarring. Ugly fractures spiraled out from his sternum, like somebody had hit him with a sledgehammer square in the chest. Paired with the missing rib and overall warped _wrongness_ of his bones, he looked like an amalgamate that had pulled itself back together. It brought back unpleasant memories.

Gaster rubbed his chest at her discomfort. “That’s old,” he muttered. Old injuries from trying to break the barrier, nearly killing himself in the process. Just one of many useless attempts. “Can I help you?”

Alphys had to blink a few times before the question registered. “U- um no I don’t think so? I just w-wanted to check on you. Y-you’ve been… quiet.” Quiet was bad. She used to get quiet sometimes, before she met Undyne. Even after, a little bit…

“Mmm.”

They stood there in awkward silence. Alphys shrugged off her own problems and tried to sneak glances at him without actually meeting his eyes. It was surprisingly easy, as he seemed reluctant to make eye contact himself. Didn’t the boys complain about him staring at people, forgetting that they could see him now?

On second glance, he was far less threatening, all slumped and exhausted. Definitely not the man she used to see on Papyrus’s blog, wrestling with him in the snow or running away from an experiment gone wrong, Sans tucked under an arm.

Very different from the indifferent façade he’d been keeping up since the accident.

Alphys took a deep breath and forced the words out. “C-can I come in?”

Gaster’s eyebrows twitched in surprise, a full raise being too much effort right now. “…Sure.” He opened the door and ushered her in, too out of it to think things through and let a near-stranger into his apartment. Alphys paused at the emptiness, but recovered quickly and scurried inside. That was concerning. She avoided the wet spots in the carpet and fidgeted in the middle of the room, unsure if she should stand or sit.

“…You can sit. Would you like anything to drink? I have tea and coffee.”

“Uh… tea?”

Gaster nodded, mute, and shuffled off. Once he was out of sight, Alphys let out the breath she had been holding and felt her stomach drop. The entire apartment was _empty._ No pictures, no furniture, nothing. The only thing was a little note on the coffee table.

*

Gaster would microwave some water in one of the few bowls he had left. It was less than ideal, but he knew how to improvise. He let his numb mind chew on Alphys’s appearance and what he should do with her, making tea on autopilot. He couldn’t exactly kick her out but had nothing left to entertain her. The plan had fallen through and –

Oh God. She was in the living room.

Gaster sprinted out of the kitchen and snatched the note out of her claws, but a glance at her expression said he was too late. That look wasn’t quite what he was expecting, a harsh glare burning through tears. Gaster turned his back on her and methodically ripped the note in half, then in half again and again, shredding it as fine as he could.

“What is this?” she whispered, her stutter gone.

“It’s nothing,” he replied automatically. He searched for a way to destroy the note, settling on vaporizing it with a miniature blaster.

“This isn’t nothing.”

Gaster didn’t speak, the fog from the previous few weeks of hell starting to lift. He was slowly coming to terms with what he almost did, and it made nausea curl in his ribcage.

“How long have you been planning this?”

This was that side of Alphys that rarely came out, the one that led a nation in the wake of the flower’s genocide, the Alphys that kept his son going after Papyrus’s murder. The Alphys that got out of her own way. Lying to her was useless, since she had already told the same lies.

“The day they died.”

Alphys nodded, her hands clasped tight in her lap. Gaster kept his back to her, not wanting to see that look again.

“I understand,” she said. “There’s so much, and it’s h-hard..”

She took a breath to steady herself and stared directly into his back. “B-but… you can’t, ok? A lot of people really care about you.”

For a moment, Gaster didn’t feel anything, didn’t say anything. The nausea melted away as her words sunk in.

At length, “So?”

Rage flashed forward, like it had in the shower. “Why should I care?” How _dare_ she, of all people? He spun around, eyelights burning brighter than they had in weeks.

“My boys were _EVERYTHING!_ The only family I had left, my best friends, the only good thing I ever made _!_ You’ve killed yourself for less!”

Alphys flinched at the last line, but met his eyes with a sort of hollow acceptance.

“Do you have any idea how many times you left Undyne, and Mettaton?! They looked for you for _days_ until they found the dust in the basement. The only thing they had left of you were the hungry amalgamates, and no explanation of who or what they were _._ The only thing that ever kicked you out of your self-loathing was the _extermination of the entire underground!_ ”

He didn’t wait for her reaction. She knew about the resets and could piece things together herself. He leaned in closer, bruised knuckles scraping on the coffee table.

“And you, of all people, are telling me that it’d hurt people?! That I _can’t_ do it _?!”_

Alphys never once wavered. She flinched, a few tears fell, but as his rant drew to a close, her face narrowed in determination. She stared him down, and it was his turn to flinch.

“Yes, because I know that it’s a mistake.”

“I w-won’t do that to the people that care about me. Never again.”

“…Even if I might want to.”

Gaster shut his mouth with an audible clack and drummed his fingers on the table. They stared each other down until his anger simmered down, some of the fight leaving his posture. Alphys could see him play the conversation back in his mind and crumple on himself.

“I’m sorry,” he eventually mumbled and looked away. “I shouldn’t have said that.”

“It’s ok.” It wasn’t, but a little white lie would help him while he was stressed and upset. Maybe she did kill herself in another timeline, actually she believed it, but that wasn’t important right now. She’d have to deal with this information later, but she could be strong for Gaster tonight, like her friends had been for her. “B-but, if even _I_ can get better, so can you.” She offered a weak smile, always at her best when self-deprecating.

Gaster settled on the floor opposite her and cradled his head in his hands, peering out at her through the holes in his palms. He was still angry, but now at the situation instead of her. “I just don’t want to be here anymore. Not without them.”

Alphys nodded and curled farther on herself, nervous now that she wasn’t being pushed. Gaster would’ve found the quirk interesting in a better frame of mind.

“S-so… I can’t really s-stop you from doing anything… but…but! I’m here for you, and so are Toriel and Asgore and Undyne an-and Frisk. Y-you can get through it if you l-let people help.” She sat up a little straighter and nodded encouragingly with the words. She even looked like she believed it. How cute.

Gaster just glared out of the hole. He had no intention of going to anyone for help, tired of being the one rescued. “I’ll think about it.” Whatever it took to get her out of the apartment and give him time to figure out what to do next.

Her smile wilted. “S-so, are you, um, you know?” She scratched nervously at her wrist. “I don’t really w-want to leave you alone.”

Gaster dragged his hand down his face and groaned. “No, no I won’t. I changed my mind.”

He gnawed absently on one of his few undamaged knuckles and stared off to the side, sockets going dark. “I couldn’t do it.”

Alphys shuddered in a weird mix of relief and horror. She believed that he wouldn’t try again, but that meant there had already been an attempt. Thank God he backed out at the end.

Gaster’s eyelights flicked back to her and he paused his gnawing. “I trust you won’t tell anyone about this.”

“Um.” Alphys picked at the hem of her shirt to avoid looking at him. 

“I don’t need anyone else fussing over me,” Gaster said, sighing.

“There’s nothing wrong with getting help,” Alphys whispered.

Gaster didn’t respond, just stared at the wall again, chewing on his knuckle. Some of them looked broken.

She understood him, though. “I w-won’t tell them everything, just that you’re n-not doing well.”

Gaster nodded slowly. Silence stretched between them as Alphys fumbled for conversation. At length, Gaster started again.

“I suppose I need a new place to live.”

At least this was progress, right? Even if he sounded like he was about to fall down? She offered the first name that came to mind, “Toriel?”

Gaster laughed, harsh and cruel. “Ha, no. Her dead best friend-boyfriend thing’s useless dad moving in while she’s trying to take care of an unstable, godlike eleven-year-old, great idea.”

Well, that explained why Sans didn’t think sarcasm was funny.

“Y-you could live with me f-for a while…” she’d have to move some things, a lot of things, but it’d be worth it to pay some kindness forward.

A little bit of the bitterness dissolved and Gaster looked at her, sizing her up and searching for dishonesty. “Aren’t you living with your girlfriend? I wouldn’t want to impose.”

“Aah, y-yes, but it wouldn’t be an im-imposition. How did you know we were living together?”

“Papyrus talked about you two incessantly.” It was easy to talk about his boys like this. He still hadn’t quite registered that they were gone. He hadn’t planned on actually dealing with their deaths, just moving on to join them.

“O-oh,” she blushed and curled even farther on herself, a little yellow sphere on the couch in an empty apartment. Gaster looked about to pass out from exhaustion, his eyelights occasionally winking out and head bobbing when he slipped into unconsciousness.

Before she left, “Do you have my address?”

She gave him the information and left him on the condition that he’d come by with his remaining things tomorrow. She made him promise, as silly as it seemed, but that family had always been weird about promises. Then she frantically texted Undyne as she scrambled home to start preparing a spare room for Gaster. She might have to share Undyne’s bedroom to give Gaster some privacy, but that shouldn’t be too bad, right?

She hoped everything would be ok.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Things can only go up from here.
> 
> EDIT: fixed some formatting whoopsies and added a title


	3. Local Skeleton Spotted at 6am, People Concerned

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which there is startled fish swearing

Dr. Gaster was irritatingly thorough.

The problem with him setting up for suicide, well, _one_ of the problems, was that it was very difficult to pick up the pieces afterwards. He had a few photos of the boys, a can of instant coffee, a few stray teabags and a single change of clothes to his name.

He still had a job, but only because he couldn’t quit without raising more suspicions. He did call in for a few sick days after Alphys left, his boss all too willing to oblige without asking questions. Tomorrow was Saturday, so Gaster took the rare opportunity to sleep in.

That meant his good eye cracked open at five in the morning, the gaudy orange couch cushions squished against his face. Papyrus had done most of the interior decorating before he…. Yeah. Gaster moaned and rubbed at his bad eye, unsticking it and sending a tingle through the crack in his skull. Despite sleeping seven hours, almost twice as much as usual, he felt more exhausted than last night.

His joints popped as he forced himself upright and pain spasmed in his neck, bent unnaturally after flopping down and passing out. His pants had dried in the night, though they were dry clean and wrinkled beyond salvation.

His skull thunked on the back of the couch as he stared at the ceiling, letting recollections of the previous night wash over him. _I fucked up the plan, Alphys found out, and now I’m moving in with her and Undyne. Great._ He huffed and flicked out a few curses in wingdings, his hands twitching in obscene gestures and aggravating his raw knuckles. The apartment was far too quiet to speak out loud.

After cycling through the worst swears he knew, he set out to pack his few belongings. He couldn’t just… _sit,_ even if his head was pounding and he felt ready to drop _._ Gaster was the man with a plan who spoke in hands, except now his only plan had fallen through and he had to scrounge for another. Gaster changed into his other pair of pants and the clean shirt, and got yesterday’s shirt out of the bathroom. He’d use it to carry his other belongings.

He stuffed the coffee and tea into his makeshift bag and went to his old room to get the photos of the boys. He had given most of the others away, but kept the ones from when they were younger. He wrapped them in the ruined pants to protect the frames without looking at them and put them in the shirt, too. The last picture caught his attention, the only one without a frame.

There were three poorly-drawn figures, one orange, one blue and one purple. All holding hands, all together. _Don’t forget_ was scribbled above the tall, purple one’s head in Sans’s messy handwriting.

The boys made that the Father’s Day after he got trapped in the void.

Gaster traced the orange and blue outlines with his thumb, looking at it with the same detached objectivity that had driven him since the car accident. He’d have to get a nice frame for this, something with a round shape and bright, conflicting colors – just like his boys. He’d also have to start getting copies of pictures back from everyo –

 

The realization that he’d have to live without them hit him like a truck.

 

He clenched his jaw and stiffened at the thought. He couldn’t. There was no way. The horrible truth threatened to swallow him, drown him, make up for lost time. He clutched the picture to his chest and curled in on himself as his sockets went dark, not even breathing save for a few strangled wheezes. This wasn’t the void, where he’d watch them die and be revived over and over again. They wouldn’t wake up in Snowdin and go about their lives like nothing had happened. This was real. This was real and he couldn’t look away.

Gaster sat there, trembling, until the lights cut off.

He bolted upright, magic from his good eye illuminating the immediate area and his nerves jittering on edge. He calmed quickly and blinked the light away, smoothing out the drawing as he did so. _Right… I stopped paying the power bills._

 

He took a shaky breath, slipped the drawing behind another photo in a frame and looked around the empty room. The emptiness didn’t bother him the night before, when it was like a hotel room, when he was leaving soon. Now, it suffocated what little composure he had left. He eventually pushed himself to his feet and cradled his bag in his arms. There was nothing left for him here, in the dark.

Not that there was anything for him anywhere else.

Still, Alphys would be upset if he threw himself off of a bridge on the way there, or jumped into traffic, or poisoned himself, or did any number of things that seemed like a good idea right now.

The CORE was still functioning. He could bullshit something about running tests, knock a few safety rails over and make it look like an accident. He’d rather his dust _not_ rest in burning hellfire, though it wasn’t much worse than the sewer like he originally planned.

Gaster chewed on a knuckle, a bad habit he had picked up after escaping, no, _getting rescued from_ , the void. Sensation had been a novelty back then, overwhelming, and the pain helped ground his flighty mind. God, he hoped it wasn’t true that people lived on in their dust. That meant fragments of Sans and Papyrus were stuck in the grille of a truck at the junkyard.

That just couldn’t be true. The world was horrible enough already without having to spend eternity at the site of your death. People spread the dust and said that the deceased lived on just to make themselves feel better. The flower abomination even said he “woke up,” right? So, he wasn’t conscious in the flower before the determination experiments. Right?

Gaster scurried out of the room with his few possessions, then out of the apartment without locking the door. He kept his head down on the way to Alphy’s place, stopping frequently to check his phone for directions. He blundered from street to street, moving vaguely West and avoiding the few others on the streets at this hour.

Granted, he wouldn’t have to worry about it if he just “accidentally” fell into traffic.

There’s no way Alphys would buy that. With his luck, he’d just disfigure himself even more and wake up in a hospital surrounded by very disappointed and stressed-out friends. He didn’t have the energy to deal with that.

\---

It took almost an hour of walking to reach his destination, though that meant he got there at a _slightly_ less ungodly hour. Undyne might be up, though definitely not Alphys. Gaster stumbled to the door of the modest little house, far enough on the edge of the city to even have its own tiny yard – a necessity for Undyne. He raised his hand to knock, hesitated, rapped his injured knuckles once, then paused again. He fidgeted on the porch and searched for an alternative that didn’t involve waking them up.

Instead, he parked himself in one of the worn wicker chairs, cradling his package in his lap. One of them would come out soon, right? This just gave him time to think about what he’d say to them… or meditate on the beauty of the sunrise or some shit like that.

Ha! He was going to brood instead. He was going to brood like a mother hen on her dead, unfertilized eggs.

While he hadn’t really cared enough about anything or anyone else to keep up with how they were doing, Toriel and Frisk had insisted on stopping by periodically to check up on him and fill him in on all the gossip. They caught on pretty quick that he wasn’t reading their text messages and started checking on him in person, not leaving when he pretended to be away. Frankly, it was a miracle of modern bullshit that he had convinced her that he was just moving out of the apartment, that _that_ was why it was so barren.

You’d think she of all people should be able to recognize a suicide plan.

Gaster snickered, then scowled. That was… cruel, and not funny at all. He felt bad for laughing. He couldn’t even begin to imagine losing a child like that. Hell, he couldn’t even accept what was happening now.

He ground his teeth and rocked the chair. The last time they had filled him in on current events, it seemed that everyone was moving on. Frisk had stopped crying themselves to sleep, Toriel had joined some old people club or another and was probably the matriarch by now, he didn’t listen to what Asgore was doing, though it probably involved gardening… everyone was back to their jobs and lives.

Gaster dug at the arm of the chair, fraying little pieces of it. The world just kept moving on without his boys, like they didn’t matter. Like they weren’t the most important thing in the world. It _shouldn’t keep moving like nothing happened._

\---

His thoughts spiraled downwards as the sun rose. The sound of the deadbolt sliding startled him out of his reverie as Undyne stepped out in her workout clothes.

“GAH!” she shrieked and jumped back. “The fuck’re you doing?!”

Gaster masked his surprise by raising an eyebrow at her. She blushed as her initial shock wore off. “Uh… I mean, what the heck are you doing, Doc?!”

“Alphys invited me over. Did she not tell you?”

“W-well yeah, but I wasn’t expecting you to lurk around my porch this early! You damn near gave me a heart attack!” She flashed him a toothy, nervous grin.

She said it to be kind and joking. Gaster was not amused.

“Mmm,” humming in a way to express understanding and remorse, a master of fake polite noises. “I apologize.”

\---

Undyne’s grin slipped as she looked the old skeleton over. The mon looked awful, like he hadn’t slept in weeks. Dark circles stood out under his sockets and weathered stress fractures appeared where other monsters would wrinkle, and that was on top of the partially paralyzed, warped half of his face. He hunched over the… shirt? Yes, the shirt in his lap, and his ruined hands twitched with all the energy missing from the rest of his body. It was really hard for her not to stare at the holes, so she made the mistake of meeting his eyes instead.

He looked pissed.

He looked pissed in a very subtle way. It looked like the _one_ time she had riled Papyrus up when she scared a bunch of human kids and refused to apologize. He had very calmly led her away from the crying children by the elbow with that exact same smile that didn’t meet his eyes, the same pleasant smile that he had comforted the kid with and sent them home with a pat on the head and some ice cream money. Once he led her far enough away not to be overheard, there were no threats, no yelling, just a tangible sense of disappointment and a quiet “Please don’t do that again.” Good God, that was creepy.

She missed the weird little noodle.

“It’s fine… Well, uh… I was going to the gym, but I can let you in now and you can get settled?” She lamely opened the door again.

Gaster’s good eye narrowed at the mention of the gym, setting Undyne on edge. His posture shifted into something more hostile before he stood abruptly and cradled his shirt to his chest. He wasn’t much taller than her, but when he stood up straight, he _loomed_. It didn’t help that the weirdo only ever wore black and gray.

She _really_ hoped she wouldn’t have to beat up Papyrus’s old man. She wasn’t entirely sure she even could. Still, she held her ground as he approached and stared him back in the eye.

\---

Gaster noticed Undyne’s shift in disposition and reigned in his emotions. She had every right to keep going to the gym without his son. It was healthy, even. He shouldn’t be angry, and he definitely shouldn’t antagonize his generous host.

He sighed and slumped, causing Undyne to visibly relax. “Sorry,” he muttered.

A confused Undyne hesitantly patted his shoulder and led him into the house. “You alright, G-man?”

He paused at the name. “…I’m fine. A little irritable because I didn’t sleep well.”

The best lies had elements of truth, after all. Either use truth or deflect with humor.

He saw her open her mouth out of the corner of his eye, could _see_ her saying “Yeah, you look like shit.” Surprisingly, she bit back the comment.

“Well, Al told me you weren’t doing too hot. Sorry about freakin’ out, but you’re welcome to stay with us as long as you need to, ok? Where’s the rest of your stuff?”

He wasn’t expecting an apology, especially since he was the one with a problem, but recovered and gestured to the shirt. “This is it.”

She frowned but said nothing, leading him through the house and stepping over the haphazard nests of pillows and blankets littering the floor. Inexplicable scorch marks marred the walls and carpet, increasing in frequency as they neared the kitchen. He couldn’t judge, given the sheer number of ridiculous things he used to do in the house. His old apartment in New Home probably still had blaster holes.

They crept past Alphys, only the tip of her snout and teeth poking out from a blanket nest on the couch. Even her snores stuttered.

Ugh, Gaster rolled his eyes at Undyne’s face. That look of affection was downright disgusting. He was happy for them, or as happy as he could manage in his current state, but he had to move out as soon as possible. An old man like him shouldn’t live with young adults in love.

Undyne ushered him into the last door on the hall, where he was assaulted by pink and fluff. He blinked a few times to clear his vision. Cotton candy, fuchsia, salmon, so many clashing shades vomited across the room and burned into his sockets.

“Uh,” he said intelligently.

“Pretty great, huh?” Undyne grinned at him. “This is Al’s room. She might be in and out to grab some things, but we shouldn’t bug you too much back here.”

They gave him the room at the far end of the house, how considerate. He was actually touched. “Thank you. I’ll try to stay out of your way.”

Undyne patted his back with far more restraint than she usually showed. “Don’t worry about it, Doc. Help yourself to anything in the fridge or cupboards. Need anything before I head out?”

Gaster already knew he didn’t, but he made a show of looking around to pretend that he had thought about it. “I should be fine. Thank you again, Undyne.”

She smiled and turned to depart, leaving Gaster to himself, a black smear in a padded pink room.

\---

It didn’t take long for Gaster to get settled with his _numerou_ s possessions. He paced the room a few times, acclimating himself to the color, sparkles and anime plastered everywhere. After completing his rounds, he sat down in front of the door and sunk almost a full inch into the plush carpet. He refused to sit on the bed, not because Alphys was dirty, but because his metaphorical skin crawled at the idea. He had never even shared a bed with his wife while she was alive.

Sometimes the boys would crawl into his bed after a nightmare and he could tolerate that, but he had to change the sheets the next morning. He’d sleep anywhere now if it meant bringing them back, but it wouldn’t, so he should stop thinking about it. He pushed his thoughts away from his boys and onto recent events.

Where the past made him feel empty, the present brought inexplicable rage. He curled up, spine popping, and dug his toes into the carpet. He was very, very grateful for Undyne and Alphys’s hospitality, he truly was, but he couldn’t stop picturing Undyne jogging without a care in the world, her supposed best friend dust at the back of her mind.

He didn’t like this new, unreasonable anger. It was a pulsing, constant fury that snapped at the strangest moments and at all the wrong people. He should apologize to Alphys about last night. He shouldn’t blame others for trying to help, for adjusting sooner. Everyone else had several week’s head start on him. He knew that. He knew it wasn’t fair to them.

He had a hard time working up the energy to care.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is late I'm sorry :D  
> I don't even have a good excuse man I literally just forgot to do it. 
> 
> EDIT: Made Gaster taller. I'm having so many conflicting feelings about his height you don't even know man.


	4. YOU CAN'T ESCAPE FRIENDSHIP

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which a bitter old man makes a friend

Good thing he didn’t have a circulatory system, or else Gaster would’ve given himself an aneurism left to his own devices. His sour mood curdled into rancidity as the sun rose. He glared at the patch of carpet in front of him as his thoughts spiraled out of control and willed it to combust through the power of his fury.

Not that his pathetic, impotent rage ever did him any good in the void, but a monster could dream.

Unfortunately even his irrational temper was burning itself out, leaving him without distraction from his own special hell. He considered exploring the room, but he was still a skeleton with standards and was not about to start rooting through Alphys’s things to amuse himself. And while he respected the woman, he did NOT want to know what she did in her spare time. He still hadn’t succeeded in bleaching that “KingDings” fic she wrote out of his mind. Sans had suggested literal bleach, to no avail. It only succeeded in making the inside of his skull slippery.

Heh, Papyrus had walked in on them when it happened. Gaster had been so surprised that he jerked his head up while Sans was still pouring the solution, ruining his nice button-down shirt. Papyrus proceeded to chastise them for making more impossible laundry for him to do, jerking the bottle out of his brother’s hands while bleach dribbled out of Gaster’s sockets. He remembered squeezing his eyes shut to try and keep it in while he doubled over laughing, but it leaked out of the cracks in his skull and got on the kitchen floor. Sans had been cackling in the corner, and Papyrus… Papyrus picked him up and dragged him to the sink to rinse out his skull, and they were all laughing and…

God, he missed his kids.

Gaster groaned and scrubbed the moisture from his sockets. He couldn’t just sit here anymore.

Exercise? That was supposed to help burn off negative energy and promote mental health or some nonsense, right? Without anything better to do and working on a frantic impulse, Gaster rolled over to do pushups. His void-warped frame protested at the abuse but he persevered until his useless body just gave up on him, his left half dissolving into clumps of semi-fluid dust. He sighed as that side went numb and he toppled into a pile of himself.

He thought this was over with. It was so difficult to pull himself back together when this happened. Thankfully his right side more or less retained its form, as well as his head.

\---

Alphys woke unusually early, both a little anxious and really excited to prepare for her guest. She nuzzled her head free of her blanket nest and lazily blinked the sleep from her eyes, squeaking in a tiny yawn. She scrabbled for her phone while keeping as much of her arm tucked in the blanket as possible, then poured over all her updates from the night prior and earlier that morning. Undyne had sent a few pictures of herself at the gym, and Alphys squee’d in delight.

Once finished commenting on everything in her feed, which didn’t take very long considering the sheer volume of posts, she wrapped her blanket around herself and shuffled to her room. She should change into something a little less trashy than her pajamas before Dr. Gaster arrived, and maybe pick out something for her and Undyne to watch once she got home. Today would be a good day, probably.

\---

Gaster was in the process of scooping himself off of the floor and pulling particles of himself out of the carpet when the door flew open. He jerked upright, eyelights growing too large and his mouth dripping open, black ick rolling off of his shoulder where his arm should be.

Alphys’s screech could be heard several houses away.

**“AGH!”** Gaster screamed too, unintentionally switching to the hellish garble of verbal wingdings. They screamed at each other for a moment until Alphys bolted out of the room, her blanket fluttering to the floor in the wake of her retreat.

“ **Al-Alph-** Alphys!” He shoved himself to his feet as best he could and followed the sound of her voice, forcing his speech into an intelligible font. “Alphys, it’s me!”

He found her tail poking out of one of the floor nests, the entire pile trembling. “Alphys? Are you alright?”

The tail disappeared, the nest shifted, and Alphys’s head poked out in its place.

“GaaaaaAHster?”

“Yes, hello. Are you alright?” He had reformed as good as new. Well, as good as when he got trapped in the void.

She giggled, her attempt at a smile more of a pained grimace, and stood. The blanket ascended with her. “Y-yes, I’m fine. This is-is-this is fine. I’m fine.”

Goodness, her stutter was awful today.

“Hhhhoow’re- are y-y-?” she gave up and made a vague gesture with her claws.

Right, follow her lead, pretend things were normal, that he _hadn’t_ just appeared in her room and melted in front of her. “I am fine as well.”

“Good…”

“…Mmm.”

They stared at each other in uncomfortable silence, Alphys’s breathing slowing to a normal rate. Gaster felt the left side of his skull go numb again and winced, only accentuating his face sloughing off. Alphys stared, but otherwise handled it very well. “…Are y-you ok?”

Gaster scrabbled at the mess, but most of it oozed through the holes in his palms. He juggled the grainy goo until he could get a grasp on it with his magic and pull it back into a recognizable form. He mostly succeeded in repressing his embarrassment. “Yes, yes, I’m fine. Void shenanigans. I have a tendency to… _dissociate_.”

“…That’s not normal.”

“I am aware.”

Gaster finished pulling himself together and shrugged to ensure everything had returned to its proper place. “It doesn’t happen often, about once every other week.”

Alphys blinked away her residual panic, shuffled forward and tentatively held out her hand. Gaster extended his restored arm for her examination. “Doe-does anything special trigger it?” she asked as she turned his hand over, prodding at the joints and forcing his fingers to flex.

“I’m not sure, honestly. I assumed it was stress, but this is the first time it’s happened since…” The words caught in his throat, but he forced them out anyway. “Since Sans and Papyrus died.”

It was a simple fact. He wasn’t about to go to pieces in front of her, never mind that he had just done literally that.

Alphys winced and nodded, squeezing his hand before continuing with her examination. “What are you u-usually doing when it happens?” she asked, slurring her u’s together.

“It’s different every time. Once, I was making coffee, then putting on a shirt, reading a report… ice skating with Papyrus.” Ugh, that was an awful memory. Papyrus should never scream like that. “I was doing pushups this time.”

Alphys glanced up at that. “Why were y-you doing pushups?”

“I was bored and seeing Undyne this morning inspired me to get back into shape.”

She had an excellent nose for bullshit and glared at him with skepticism, but didn’t press the topic. He’d have to be careful with her.

She broke eye contact and kneaded his carpals. Gaster recognized it as one of the sensory tests when the amalgamates were created, but pretended not to notice. People usually didn’t take his time spying in the void very well. “Can you feel that?”

“Yes.”

“Any pain?”

“No,” and she pressed in a different spot. “No, no, no, yes a little.”

Alphys frowned and released him, blushing a little when she realized that she started an examination without permission. “Weird. Y-you seem normal. U-uh, sorry.”

Gaster waved off her apologies. “I appreciate your concern. So far, it has been irritating but not permanent.”

“It doesn’t hurt,” he added, remembering one of her greatest fears about the amalgamates.

She perked up, a tiny smile forming. “Really? Not at all?”

“Sometimes my SOUL hurts trying to pull the dust back, but only when I try and force it to reform faster. Even then, it’s not bad. Dissociating does not hurt by itself. It’s… tingly? Very numb, and surprising when my limbs aren’t where I expect them to be.”

Gaster felt the smallest twinge of happiness at the relief on Alphys’s face. Granted, his condition was very different than the determination experiments, but the amalgamates had never made any indication that they were in pain. He hoped he could give her some peace of mind. She really was much too hard on herself.

“If y-you want, I could do some tests? Maybe we could figure out what’s wrong?”

“No thank you,” Gaster said before thinking.

On seeing her wilt, he quickly forced a smile. “Not that I don’t trust you, Alphys! I just…” He scrambled for a reason, though it was very difficult when even he didn’t know why he was resisting. He _did_ trust Alphys as a scientist. If anyone could figure out what was wrong, it was her.

Maybe that’s why he didn’t want her help.

“It’s personal,” he settled on. Closer to the truth than he would’ve liked, but he couldn’t think of anything better.

She nodded in understanding, still cheerful from the good news about the amalgamates. “Ok, but let me know if you change y-your mind, ok? It’s no trouble ok? I’d be happy to help!” She smiled wide, definitely something she picked up from Undyne. Her face was not used to that motion and got hung up on her teeth. Cute, in a painfully awkward sort of way.

Self-conscious from the wobbly grin, Alphys pulled her blanket farther around herself. “Uh… I should go, uh, y-you know.”

Gaster didn’t know, but nodded anyway. “Would you like me to start breakfast?”

Maybe he could salvage some of this morning. He’d die before becoming a freeloader.

Alphys made a face, but her voice was polite. “No, no, that’s fine! I can do it. I was, uh, going to warm some Chinese food, if you’d like some.”

How dare… the little lizard thought he was a bad cook! He’d have to prove her wrong sometime, maybe when his injured ego was enough to motivate him through the crushing despair. Or when Hell froze over, whichever came first. Chinese food would suffice in the meantime.

“That sounds wonderful, thank you.”

She scurried into her room and closed the door, leaving Gaster in the living room. He picked his way to the couch and tried not to be judgmental at the clutter. Not everyone was as neat as Papyrus.

_Or even as neat as a trash tornado, evidently._

No, bad Gaster. Badster. He needed to stop thinking cruel things. He needed to stop obsessing over upsetting things. He flopped on the couch and made puns out of his name instead.

_Wingnut. Dingus. Ding-Dong. Ring-a-Ding. Dadst- GODDAMMIT._

Gaster sighed and hooked his fingers in his sockets. Hopefully Alphys wouldn’t walk in for a few moments while he collected himself. He got a few minutes before he heard her padding through the hallway.

Gaster pulled his hands away from his face before he could traumatize her yet again. Digging in his eyes was painless, but apparently unnerving to others. He slapped on a smile as she came into the living room, wearing a pink sweatshirt several sizes too large and gray pants. Gaster wasn’t quite sure how she managed that with her tail but didn’t care enough to ask.

“Do you want anything to drink?” Alphys asked, her stutter improving, as she went to the kitchen. Thankfully she hadn't noticed his demeanor.

Gaster rose to join her. “No thank you,” he said out of habit.

He really needed to stop automatically declining things. He was getting a caffeine headache and would’ve loved some coffee.

“Okay… we have soda in the fridge if y-you want some later, and tea.”

“Thank you very much.”

Gaster followed her into the kitchen and opened the smaller of the two fridges as she set out a microwavable bowl. He frowned at the heat pouring out of the fridge and waved his hand around inside.

“…What the actual hell,” he muttered.

“Oh! That’s Undyne’s fridge! The cold one is to the left.”

Gaster closed the door and moved to the real fridge, repeatedly signing _what_ to himself in wingdings. “…Why?”

Alphys laughed. “Oh, she doesn’t like c-cold food, so I made her a hot fridge!”

Again he signed to himself, _what._

Whatever, he couldn’t judge. He retrieved the box of takeout and two cans of soda. Alphys thanked him and they awkwardly watched the food spin in the microwave, each sipping on their own soda in silence.

“Have you ever microwaved an egg?” he asked at length.

They chattered about their respective microwave adventures. Once Alphys had left the fork in her noodles and almost burned down her lab. Once Gaster had intentionally microwaved a spoon to show the boys what would happen. It was one of the few times the boys had been equally excited, Sans at the science and Papyrus at the fire.

“Sans always tried to get me to microwave things…” Alphys said and smiled. “He kept bringing me microwaves to fix from the dump to try and take my mind off o-of… y-you know.”

Gaster nodded. Sans had been a good friend during the determination experiments, if a bit flippant. It was nice to talk with somebody who truly appreciated him. Sans was very good at distracting people from their problems.

“Oh! One time he got me to build a microwave from scratch!”

Gaster smiled as she explained every last detail about her homemade microwave, almost squealing in her excitement. They carried their food and conversation into the living room. Alphys curled on the leftmost couch cushion, talking all the while, and Gaster wedged himself into the opposite corner. They spent the next hour like that.

\---

The door rebounded off the wall when Undyne barged in.

“HEY!” she yelled. Residual sweat glistened on her scales as she slammed the door behind her, causing both of the other monsters to jump. “What up nerds?!”

“Undyne!”

“Hello,” Gaster tried not to sound disappointed. Him and Alphys were just having a lovely conversation about coupling magic and computers, and he got the feeling that Undyne wouldn’t appreciate it the same way.

“DUDE I ran like fifteen miles and bench-pressed four HUGE dudes, ASGORE sized!”

“That’s great Undyne!”

“…At once?” Gaster asked. That seemed incredibly unsafe.

“YEAH? HOW ELSE?!!”

“…Wow. OK.”

“I’m gonna go take a nice _hot, steamy_ shower. Bye Al!” Undyne flashed a grin stuffed with sharpened teeth and trotted to the bathroom. Gaster glanced over and wordlessly passed Alphys a tissue for her nosebleed.

Alphys flushed bright red and hid her face in the tissue. Gaster just stared at her with a slight smile, waiting for her to look up. Once she did, he smiled wider. “I thought that only happened in anime.”

She shrieked and pulled the entire blanket over her head, and Gaster chuckled. Young people were great.

\---

He, however, was an old man and should leave these two young ladies to their business. He stood and patted his pockets to ensure he had his wallet once they heard Undyne shut the water off. “Thank you very much for breakfast, it was delicious. Do you want help washing up before I go to the store?”

Alphys shifted the blanket so she could peek out at him with one eye. “W-what do you need? Me and Un-Undyne can get it if you want.”

“I appreciate it, but no thank you. I need to get some clothes and… a picture frame.”

Alphys frowned and opened her mouth to say something, but Undyne cut her off from down the hallway.

“HEY, G-man, you’d probably fit in my clothes.”

It was difficult to emote properly with half his face paralyzed, but Gaster felt he portrayed the terror pretty well. He couldn’t object before Undyne had thrown a wadded shirt as his head. He "caught" the black tank top with his face, pried it off and held it at arm’s length.

“…I’m sorry, I can’t wear this.”

“Aw man, why not? Show some skin! Er.. bone!” Undyne walked in roughly toweling her waist-length hair.

“Undyne, the last time I wore anything but a turtleneck, people tried to rush me to the hospital.”

“Whaaaat? No way man.”

Gaster frowned. “I promise that my scarring is very extensive. I would rather not wear anything too revealing.”

“Oh come on, Gaster, how bad can it be? Ladies love scars!” As Undyne talked, Alphys looked as uncomfortable as Gaster felt.

“It is very bad.”

Undyne stepped forward and steamrolled over Alphys’s protests. She jabbed a finger in Gaster’s chest. “I think you’re just self-conscious! I bet you look great!”

Gaster scowled and yanked down the neck of his shirt to expose his fractured collarbone. The bone was misshapen like poorly-molded clay and crisscrossed with old cracks. Her grin drooped at the sight.

“Oh.”

“Yes, and it gets considerably worse. Forgive me if I’m reluctant to wear a tank top.”

Undyne smiled nervously. “Well… uhhhh…. it’s not too bad! Actually, it’s pretty AWESOME!” Gaster half-smiled, though he looked anything but amused, and handed her the shirt back.

“Would you two like me to pick anything up while I’m out?”

Both women declined and Alphys mouthed _sorry_ while Undyne wasn’t looking. He turned to go.

“Geez…” he heard Undyne mutter. He chose to ignore it and let himself out.

\---

Gaster returned with three new sets of clothing after several hours. He didn’t mind the ridiculously long walks if it kept him out of the house, though it seemed that it had given Undyne time to make plans without him.

“HEY, DOC!” she screamed as soon as he walked in the door. He flinched, but managed a hello anyway. Undyne leapt off the couch, took a battle stance and pointed at him.

“TOMORROW! WE! ARE! SPARRING WITH ASGORE! NGAHH!” She ran over for a noogie, but Gaster sidestepped and held up a hand to restrain her.

“Excuse me?” he asked. Alphys scurried out of the kitchen at the commotion and took Undyne’s hand. She ignored her.

“YEAH! A GOOD PLAY Fight will help you blow off some steam... It’ll be… fun…” Her enthusiasm bled away on seeing Gaster’s expression. It wasn’t _quite_ murderous, but his tacked-on smile highlighted his empty, furious sockets.

“Or, ya know, not…” she whispered.

“Have you already told Asgore that we’re doing this.” His voice pitched oddly cheerful. It was incredibly unnerving.

“Maybe?”

Gaster flicked out incomprehensible swears in wingdings and closed his eyes. He wasn’t going to say anything and start screaming at his hosts. That was rude. He shouldn’t be so angry that they had gone behind his back and made plans for him like a child. It felt completely justified, but was still rude. _They’re only trying to help,_ he told himself.

“Y-you don’t have to go,” Alphys said. Undyne just glanced back and forth between her girlfriend and her guest with a nervous grin.

Gaster stopped swearing and popped his knuckles instead. “No… no, it’s fine. I’ll go if you already told him. But next time,” he glared at Undyne. “ _Ask me first_.”

“Okay, okay!” she jumped back and held up her hands. Alphys grimaced and led her away.

“W-w-we we have leftovers if y-you’re hungry, Gaster. Do y-you want to watch anime with us?” she asked over her shoulder. Undyne spun around and pulled free of Alphys.

“I’ll get you whatever you want! Tea? Coffee?”

“It’s quite alright, thank you,” Gaster replied and tried not to wince.

“Are you sure? You just stay right there and – ” Undyne asked.

“ _Yes! I am not a cripple!”_ He couldn’t hide the frustration from his voice this time, and it came out in a strangled hiss. His metaphorical stomach churned at their hurt expressions.

“I’m sorry,” he quickly followed. “I just… please. I can do it.” Please just let this train wreck of a day end already.

“Alright,” Undyne said, her fins flat against her head.

Quickly, how to escape? “Can I take a shower?” Gaster asked.

Alphys stared at him and he smiled as comfortingly as he could. “ _Just_ a shower.”

“Yeah, sure, whatever. You don’t have to ask. It’s down the hall on the left. Need a towel?” Undyne asked.

Gaster almost said no. “…Yes please. Thank you.”

\---

 

After a few awkward exchanges, he was blessedly alone. He didn’t really need to take showers daily, being a skeleton without bodily fluids besides nervous sweat and tears, but Papyrus had gotten him into the habit. He stripped and got into the freezing shower.

Why waste their hot water?

Gaster shivered and let the water dribble into his skull as he thumped his head against the shower wall. Why was he so angry? Undyne had been Papyrus’s best friend, the person that was kindest to him besides his brother.

Gaster groaned and tried to enjoy his shower. He failed, miserably, and prolonged his suffering by meticulously scrubbing every inch of his body. He’d have to go back out there eventually and talk to his sons’ best friends, try to act like a respectable adult instead of the irritable child he was, and he dreaded it.

Eventually he couldn’t justify standing there anymore. He toweled off and threw on his old clothes, then crept out into the living room with the girls.

The good half of his face twitched in a smile at the cold-blooded pile on one couch cushion. Alphy’s head spikes were just visible past the blanket surrounding both women, Alphys in Undyne’s lap. The taller woman grinned and patted the spot next to her, forgiving his earlier outburst.

Gaster sat in the middle of the couch, not crowding them but not asocial on the opposite corner. Alphys waved from her nest and Undyne held up her fist for a bump, which Gaster obliged. It hurt his knuckles, but overall, this wasn’t too bad.

He could do this as long as she didn’t start asking questions.

“Dude, why are you freezing!?”

_Well then_. “I took a cold shower.”

“Uh, why?!”

Gaster wasn’t going to get angry. Not this time. Not tonight. “…Because I wanted to? I’m sorry I don’t have a better answer.”

“Huh, weirdo,” she muttered. “OH! I’m sorry about springing that thing about Asgore on ya, but it’s great that you agreed to go. Fluffybuns has been worried about you!”

“Has he now?” While not surprised, Asgore tended to worry about a lot of things, Gaster was touched.

“YEAH! Now you can go over there and show him you haven’t, I dunno, jumped off a bridge or something!”

Where Alphys cringed so hard he was afraid she strained something, Gaster smiled in dark amusement. He laughed. “No, no, nothing like that. I suppose I should let him know that I am alive.”

Alphys just stared at him open-mouthed. He smiled at her, then he and Undyne chattered about the plan for the next day. They’d leave early, at around seven. Alphys looked uncomfortable the entire time.

At a lull in conversation, Alphys blurted, “HeyDoctorGastercanyoucomewithmetogetasoda?”

“Of course? And please call me Wingdings.” Undyne snorted at the name as he stood to join Alphys. He shot a glare at her over his shoulder, intending it to be friendly. She still winced, misreading the gesture, and he felt bad. He was getting into a habit of hurting people. He hated it.

\---

 

“Yes?” he asked.

“Doctor, I’m so sorry I SWEAR I didn’t say any-y-y-anything!”

Gaster waved her off. “It’s fine, I know you didn’t.”

“Undyne jus- wait what?”

“She says things like that.” Gaster shrugged and ran a finger around the hole in his palm. “Only a funny coincidence, no harm done.”

Alphys gaped for a moment, then giggled nervously. “Ah… aha… okay, good?”

“Yes.” Gaster turned to make sure Undyne was still on the couch watching the show, and he frowned. “And… I need to apologize to you about last night. What I said was inexcusable.”

Alphys blushed bright red and looked at the floor. “Oh no, Doctor, it’s fine. Y-you’re grieving. Y-you’ve been through a lot, so y-you’d say things you normally w-wouldn’t.”

“I think that was a bit cruel for something ‘I wouldn’t normally say.’ I’m sorry.”

“Gaster, no, it’s fine. I under- I understand.”

“I… just… um…” Gaster flicked out a few aborted thoughts in wingdings, desperately trying to put his feelings into words and growing frustrated at his inability.

“…Thank you,” he said at length. “For everything.”

“Y-you don’t need to thank me, Gaster.” Alphys looked up from the floor and smiled warmly. Her lips still got hung on her teeth, but the look in her eyes got the point across. She forgave him.

It made him sick.

He smiled quickly and turned to get a soda, anything to avoid that undeserved kindness. Still, he couldn’t help but feel guiltily relieved. Alphys was a good woman, and like it or not, her opinion was starting to matter to him.

When he pulled back from the fridge, two cans in hand, Alphys shifted from foot to foot and smiled again. It was nice seeing her happy. Gaster mimicked the expression to keep her from worrying and handed her one of the sodas. They grinned awkwardly at each other, neither knowing how to proceed with conversation, until Undyne’s voice broke the silence.

“ _OH HELL YES!”_ they heard her scream in the living room. “You guys almost done in there? This part is AWESOME!!!”

They both scurried out of the kitchen. Undyne was too amped up for Alphys to sit in her lap again, half-standing, half-crouched, so the lizard curled on the middle cushion and Gaster wedged himself into the far corner.

\---

They passed the rest of the afternoon like that. The two cold-blooded women alternated between shouting at the television or whispering sickeningly sweet things into each other’s ears. At a particularly diabetic moment, Gaster stood to take his leave.

“Good night, ladies.”

Undyne looked up from nuzzling Alphys’s nose. “What? It’s only, like, 10.”

Gaster shrugged and collected his assortment of soda cans. “I’m old.”

Alphys flopped off Undyne’s lap and hopped to her feet, trailing at his heels. “Ok Dr. Gaster! Do y-you want more blankets or any-ything?”

“It’s Wingdings, please, and no I don’t…” Gaster paused. “…Actually, could I get another comforter and a pillow?”

Alphys positively lit up and sprinted away to get the requested things. Gaster crushed the cans into the recycling container and made his way back towards her room, where she was waiting. She bounced with nervous energy and enthusiasm.

It was sweet.

“Here y-you go, Doctor Gas- I mean Wingdings.” She couldn’t help but snort. Gaster smiled at the attempt and took the bedding from her arms.

“You can call me Gaster if that would be easier.”

“Pfft, ok Gaster. I’m sorry.”

“It is quite alright.” Gaster nudged the door open with his foot. “It is a hilarious name. I got picked on a lot as a child.”

Alphys made a strange sound, halfway between a squee and “Aww.”

Gaster chuckled. “It’s fine, Alphys.” She pouted anyway.

“Who pi-picked on you?! I-I-I’ll fight them!” She bared her front teeth in a snarl and held her claws at chest level. It was the opposite of intimidating.

“They’re long dead, Alphys, don’t worry.” He couldn’t keep the smile off his face as she followed him into the room and started rooting in her drawers. Gaster politely looked away while she got her clothes out for the next morning.

“Sorry, sorry,” she muttered. “I forgot to get these earlier. Iii’ll get the rest of my clothes tomorrow while you’re with Asgore.”

“Alphys, it’s fine. It’s your room. I just appreciate you letting me stay.”

Undyne poked her head in, her ponytail undone. “G’night, Doc. If you need anything at all, _anything,”_ she jabbed a finger at him. “Lemme know.”

“Thank you,” he said.

“And, uh, Doc?”

“Mm?”

“I… uh… I really cared about Papyrus. And Sans.”

Any warm, fuzzy feelings evaporated, swallowed by a dull ache. The statement caught Gaster off guard, and he couldn’t think of anything intelligent to respond with.

Undyne waited a second longer before continuing. “You know that, right?”

“Of course,” he responded blandly, his eyelights gone. “You were Papyrus’s best friend.”

Alphys had frozen by her drawer, trying not to interrupt the moment. Undyne’s fins drooped and she stared at the carpet, biting her lip. Gaster hugged the comforter a little tighter to his chest and looked at nothing.

“I… uh… man I’m shit at this,” Undyne muttered to herself. She took a deep breath and attempted to make eye contact with him, an impossible task without his eyelights. “If you need to talk, just let me know. Let _either_ of us know.”

Alphys nodded but didn’t say anything.

“Ok,” Gaster said. Undyne kept looking at him expectantly, like she expected him to have something more to say.

When he didn’t, she tried to fill the silence. “We really… we loved them.”

Still he said nothing. “…We understand, Doc. We… we know what you’re going through.”

Gaster’s eyelights snapped back to life and he stared right back at her. “ **No, you don’t.”**

She lost a friend. He lost his best friends, his children, his only family.

 

Undyne tilted her head at the wingdings, not understanding and unable to read his tone. Gaster blinked once and swallowed the variety of emotions threatening to overwhelm him. “I appreciate that. Really, I do… and I would like to get some sleep.”

She wilted and Gaster turned his back to the entryway. Alphys scurried out past him and closed the door, whispering good night as she did. He returned the wish and waited until he heard both sets of footsteps retreat down the hall.

Then he spread the comforter out on the floor and made himself a makeshift bed. He took off his shirt and folded it by his new clothes. He plugged his phone into its charger and set an alarm for the morning, not that he needed it. Then, he laid down and bundled himself in the blanket, face down. He mindlessly muttered a prayer.

Only after he completed his nightly ritual did he let himself deal with the mess going through his head. He moaned into the pillow and tried, just for a second, to try and get a hold of what he felt. He mentally stretched as far as he could, trying to reach the end of his grief and anger and whatever else it was that he felt, but it was too big. It was going to swallow him if he kept trying.

So, he stopped trying.

He just lay there until sleep finally overtook him.


	5. "the mexican grainy thing"

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Alphys and Gaster have issues (as usual)

Gaster dreamed of the accident.

For some reason, he lived in Alphys and Undyne’s house with his boys. He shrugged it off as dream logic and turned to Sans on his right. They sat at the dinner table, where plates of sugary quiche sat in front of each chair. Papyrus’s humming and interesting smells drifted from the kitchen.

Sans had taken a few bites and was busy playing with the rest of the food. He paused when he felt Gaster staring, then glanced up. The corners of his sockets crinkled in amusement.

“…dad, you’re doing that thing again.”

Gaster blinked, still reveling in his son’s presence. “ **Thing**?”

“the staring thing.”

“ **Ha, no, I was just… looking at you. It’s good to see you**.” Gaster knew he was being a sad sap, but didn’t care. He propped his chin on his fist and just enjoyed looking at his son. He looked tired and disheveled, but content, and that’s all that mattered.

Sans raised an eyebrow and smiled a little wider. “huh. well, hi i guess.”

As he returned to picking at his food, Papyrus bounced into the kitchen with drinks in his arms. He didn’t spill a drop as he tossed the glasses of milk to his family. They clattered on the table.

As soon as Papyrus entered the room, Gaster jumped out of his chair and spread his arms. “ **Papyrus!”**

Papyrus did a double take and ran to him. “FATHER!”

They hugged. Gaster may have held on a little tighter and longer than necessary. Papyrus always gave the best hugs, like he put actual, physical love into them. It was just as strong, firm, and intentional as Gaster’s own feelings. Papyrus always made a strained sound when he hugged, a cute, high-pitched whine, and rocked from side to side. Normally Gaster didn’t care for physical contact, but Papyrus hugs, Papyrus hugs were something else. He needed this one to make up for lost time. 

Eventually, Gaster reluctantly let Papyrus pull away. Gaster held his son at arm’s length and looked up into his smiling face. He let himself be even more of a weenie and ran his thumb over Papyrus’s cheekbone, memorizing the texture.

It was all so painfully _normal,_ like nothing had happened.

Papyrus cocked his head to the side, into the touch. He smiled, but his browbones furrowed in concern. “YOU’RE AWFUL AFFECTIONATE TODAY!”

Gaster made a face. “ **I missed you. Can’t an old man just love on his children?”**

“you seem off,” Sans offered from the table. “or at least stranger than usual. what’s buggin’ you?”

“ **It’s nothing.”**

Both boys immediately glared at him. Papyrus had his finger up for a good nagging about emotional health or something, but Sans cut him off.

“bullshit.”

Thankfully Gaster didn’t have to defend himself as Papyrus spun around to argue with his brother.

“SANS! LANGUAGE!”

“sorry,” he deadpanned, then stared Gaster dead in the eye. “regular shit.”

“UGH. COME HERE!” Papyrus picked up Sans by the back of the hoodie and dragged him out of the dining room.

“where we goin’, bro?”

“TO CLEAN YOUR FILTHY MOUTH!”

They disappeared around the corner, where Gaster couldn’t see. He still heard their voices drifting through the house.

“come on bro, it’s not a big deal.”

“IT’S A BAD HABIT! LIKE YOUR EATING HABITS!”

“you’re really _dragging_ me through the mud, aren’tcha?”

Gaster heard a muffled _whomp_ accompanying Papyrus’s groan, and Sans muttered “ow.” He laughed softly and hugged himself to stave off the unpleasant feelings of anxiety, now that his boys were out of sight. They were just around the corner. They’d be right back.

They weren’t right back.

“ **Boys?”** After minutes of silence, Gaster worked up the nerve to call around the corner, though he stayed in the dining room. They didn’t answer, so he took a step towards the corner.

“ **Papyrus? Sans?”**

He heard Papyrus’s voice at a distance but couldn’t make out the words. He rounded the corner, and met the living room of the Snowdin house. It didn’t phase him, and he continued following the sound of their voices.

“ – skittish to me.”

“I AGREE. WE SHOULD DO SOMETHING TO CHEER HIM UP!”

Gaster walked a little faster to catch up. They sounded several rooms away, though things were hazy.

“LET’S COOK SOMETHING SPECIAL FOR HIM! HE LOVES OUR COOKING.”

“sure does, bro.”

“I’M THINKING… ZITI. ZUCCHINI ZITI.”

“how ‘bout quinn… quo… the mexican grainy thing that starts with a q.”

“OH HE LOVES THE LETTER Q! QUINOA?”

“yeah that.” 

Aw, his sons knew him so well. Quinoa was one of his favorite foods, even though it wasn’t strictly Mexican. He smiled, put a little bit at ease, and was almost to his children.

“SPLENDID IDEA! WE NEED TO GO GET SOME! COME ON, SANS!”

The closest grocery store was a ten minute drive.

“ **WAIT NO!”** Gaster screamed and started sprinting to the next room. They ignored him, and he heard the door slam shut as they left the house.

Each threshold he passed put him in a new room, sometimes mashing parts of the Snowdin home, the New Home apartment and their old surface apartment together. The rooms were connected without order, and he ran through so fast they blurred together. He distantly heard the screech of tires and crunch of metal, and ran even faster. Two more false doors, and he lost what little composure remained.

A blaster materialized at his shoulder and punched a hole through the wall. Gaster jumped through the opening before the dust settled and slipped on the wet grass, but kept his footing and ran to the wreck in front of the house.

A large truck had slammed into the front of Papyrus’s red convertible, completely flattening the front end. Gaster ran as fast as he could as a crowd started to gather, flicked his wrist to summon a ram-horned blaster, and slammed it into the front of the black truck. It groaned back a few feet.

Gaster skidded to a halt in the newly freed space. He ignored the gray and red splattered across the passenger seat and focused on his remaining son.

“ **PAPYRUS!”**

Papyrus weakly looked up from the steering wheel. His eyes were half closed, and fissures to match his father’s ran along his skull.

His brother’s dust coated the right side of his face.

“…Daddy?”

“ **Pap, Pap I got you.”** Gaster’s voice didn’t shake as he pried the door open and cut through the seatbelt with a bullet.

“Dad, where’s Sans?” Papyrus tried to look to his right, but Gaster gently pulled him to face the other way.

“ **Sshh, don’t worry about that. I got you. You’re going to be alright, ok?”**

Papyrus mewled pathetically as Gaster laid his hands on either side of his face and poured as much healing magic as he could without sending him into shock. It didn’t feel like healing should, more like the magic was being swallowed by the void.

“Daddy, I…” Papyrus didn’t seem to be looking at anything in particular. Gaster’s hands were shaking, but not his voice.

“ **It’s ok. It’ll be ok. I got you.”**

“No, I…”

Gaster squeezed his shoulder and glanced down to check for other injuries.

The collision had compressed the driver compartment into a mess of jutting machinery and sharp edges. A sheet of metal had severed Papyrus’s spine, leaving his pelvis and legs scattered on the floor. Parts were starting to dust.

Somehow, Gaster didn’t scream.

Papyrus laid his head back down on the steering wheel and stared past his father. Gaster recovered and snatched up his head for more healing. He dumped all the magic he could spare, and then more. None of it was sticking. Gaster tried every possible healing technique he could think of, then made up new ones on the spot. “ **Papyrus, stay with me. Stay, please.”**

Gaster started to flag. Papyrus titled his head to the side and pawed for his father’s arm. He missed, and his hand flopped back onto the seat. He focused a little bit and looked Gaster almost in the eye. “…Love you.”

“ **No! Pap-“**

Papyrus turned to dust in his hands in one massive surge.

Gaster stared at the pale gray trickling through the holes in his palms, stuck to his face, everywhere in the vehicle.

It was everywhere. It was his everything. Gaster felt the world drop away, swallowed by the horrible gray.

\---

He woke up with a whimper.

\---

Three in the morning was Alphys’s work time, because she was totally healthy. She sat bundled in a blanket nest with a tarp and an adult jetpack prototype in her lap, warm soda on the coffee table and k-pop playing at a reasonable volume. Haphazard notes covered the immediate area – mostly disjointed comments for when she wrote the paper – because apparently humans insisted on documentation for science. Keeping better notes probably wasn’t a bad thing, considering her track record. Alphys winced and tried not to think too hard about the amalgamates.

The effort was useless, as always. She still needed to follow up with Lemon Bread, and Mrs. Drake needed to share their consciousness a little better. Then she needed to start the new batch of anti-determination serum, and send repair kits for Mettaton, and get a new robot prototype sketched out and that was due in like four days and she hadn’t even started, and it was getting really hard to focus on her jetpack pet project that she really shouldn’t be working on right now. But hey, at least she was procrastinating real work with a different kind of work. That was good, right?

She chugged half the soda in one go and wrung her hands to get the cramps out, and maybe get them to stop shaking. It didn’t work. Instead of risking messing up her prototype, she pulled out her calculation sheets. They were the only coherent notes she kept.

She heard a noise as she rechecked the same equation for the twelfth time. She squeaked when she saw Gaster standing in the hallway, far closer than expected, and shoved down her anxiety and disappointment. The company would be nice, not a distraction from work she really needed to do. She could push the work back a little more. She was great at doing that.

“OH! H-h-hi Doctor!”

He didn’t respond, just cocked his head to the side. He was hugging himself loosely and his eyelights had gone out, making it impossible to tell which direction he was looking.

Alphys didn’t like it.

“Uh… um, Doc- I mean Gaster? Are y-you okay?” She shoved her stuff to the side and clutched her blanket closer.

Gaster stared ahead, or wherever he was really looking, then opened his mouth. The sound he made set Alphy’s teeth on edge and her blood run colder. Whatever language he spoke sounded like Mettaton on the fritz mixed with the Memory Head’s screeching, _definitely_ not something out of nature. She stood and, against her better judgement, took a few panicked steps closer.

“Gaster? What’s wrong?!”

He blinked until his eyelights eventually guttered back to life. He squinted at her like he saw her for the first time.

“…What?”

She hugged her blanket a little tighter. “Are y-you okay?”

He squinted harder and blinked, slowly. “Uhh yeah, yeah I’m fine. I’m… going to take a… a shower.”

Well, that didn’t bode well. Alphys really couldn’t deal with this well right now she didn’t want to mess it up. She didn’t know what to do. Should she let him go? Watch him? No, that was weird, but what if he wasn’t ok? He definitely wasn’t ok. She stood paralyzed with indecision while he shuffled into the bathroom.

It really wasn’t any of her business, but Alphys was worried. He looked very not good.

Her concern and nosiness won out. Alphys soundlessly padded over to the bathroom once she was sure he was in the shower and put her earhole to the door.

She could hear him crying.

Alphys covered her mouth to muffle her little squeak of dismay. She could relate to crying in the bathroom. It was a great place to cry, honestly. Very underrated. It was safe and quiet and nobody would bother you.

She wasn’t sure whether to stay and keep an eye, uh, ear, on him and make sure he didn’t do anything stupid, or give him privacy. Crying was a good sign, though. He was feeling _something,_ so he probably wasn’t going to try to kill himself again. Probably. Hopefully.

Yeah, she was going to stay.

She retrieved her soda and a blanket, left her prototype, and settled at the base of the door. Gaster was so quiet. All she could hear were intermittent sniffles and faint rattling over the sound of the water. Still, he seemed to be doing the opposite of calming down as time passed. The rattling got louder until she heard one sudden, medium volume sob. The rattling subsided, though, and Gaster sniffled a few times before he seemed to get a grip.

Eventually, she heard the water turn off. She scrambled back to the couch needlessly quick and pretended to work, her back to the hallway. He still took another several minutes to come out in the same pair of pants. She whipped around when she heard the door open, a smile taped on.

“H-hi Doctor!”

Gaster blushed, gray magic brightening his cheekbones, and gave a halfhearted wave. With the other, he clutched a shirt to his chest. “Hello, Alphys. Sorry.”

He bolted into the bedroom before she could say anything.

Alphys wilted a little and turned back to her work. She would give him five minutes. If he wasn’t back in five minutes, she’d go check on him.

\---

Just as she stood to check on him, she felt a presence behind her. Gaster had snuck into the room and was standing right over the back of the couch.

Alphys flinched and fell back on the couch.

“Eep! H-hi!”

Gaster had a different gray dress shirt on, and he winced at her fear. “Sorry. I forget that I can’t just…” His hands kept going, but he looked too distracted to finish the sentence verbally. He glanced to the side and snapped, like he was looking for the words, and dropped his hands with an irritated sigh.

He looked back to her and his face softened. “Are you alright?”

Alphys tried to smile encouragingly, though she knew her reflection could break glass. God, she hated her smile, no matter what Undyne said. Undyne said a lot of things.

“Of course Doc, er… Gaster! How are y-y… how are you?”

He put on a smile too, a big one. It looked real. “I am quite fine. The shower was refreshing.”

Alphys stared at him. There was no way he was just suddenly fine. People didn’t work like that. Well maybe other people did, but Alphys definitely didn’t. Crying alone in the shower wouldn’t fix anything, not without talking to someone too.

Gaster saw the expression on her face and quickly deflected. “What are you working on?”

“Oh, uh. Just a little, um, a little side project. It’s nothing special.” Alphys tried to push her work under some papers.

“But what is it?” Gaster stood at a polite distance and leaned on the back of the couch. His eyelights were bright and focused, if a little unstable.

Alphys fidgeted and picked at the edge of the tarp. “It’s just a little jetpack. Not very strong, really. The output needs w-work.”

Gaster tapped his finger, quiet for a moment. “…May I see?”

Oh dear. She didn’t want _the_ Dr. Gaster looking at her pathetic prototype. She really didn’t want to ruin what little respect he might have somehow developed for her. She wanted to hide it, tell him it was nothing, just anything to keep from embarrassing herself.

“Sure?” she said instead.

Alphy mentally kicked herself as she handed off the little box with a wing sticking out. Gaster took it carefully, with both hands, and titled it in the lamplight. His eyelights constricted and he slowly joined her on the couch.

Great. He looked horrified. Anxiety gnawed in Alphys’s stomach as the old skeleton turned her machine over and over, but never poked it. He must think it was too fragile to handle, or maybe he just didn’t want to look any closer.

At length, Gaster looked up at her. She had a million excuses and decoys running around in her head already. It’s just a toy, a model, I haven’t done much research, that sort of thing.

“This is amazing,” he said.

“Oh well y-you know it’s just garb– wait what?”

Gaster nodded and scooted a little closer, still not close enough to touch, but closer. “This is… you… how?”

He rested the prototype on the tarp to free up one hand, which he spastically started signing. “How did you fit all this in here?”

“Uh, it’s really not a big deal. It’s nothing like yo-your CORE.”

Gaster gave her a look of utter confusion. She shrugged and curled into her blanket. “It’s not, um, impressive…”

“…Alphys, the CORE is bigger than the castle _._ This is smaller than my _phone_.”

“But the CORE – “

“Alphys, please. _Anyone_ could’ve built the CORE with as much time as I had.”

That… was definitely not true. She was about to say as much, but he stood and cut off her protests. “This is _almost_ as complex, and you fit it in a box!”

She didn’t know what to do with the praise except sit there, blushing like an idiot and mouth hanging open. Gaster gestured to her, the prototype and her notes in a grand sweep. He was even smiling, his face moving unhindered by the scars. 

“I cannot even wrap my head around fitting the circuitry and fuel systems alone into something so small. This is beautiful.”

Gaster clasped his hands in front of his chest and beamed down at the lizard. He looked so much like Papyrus, it made Alphys’s soul twinge.

As if he could read her mind, Gaster slumped a little and sat down self-consciously, though his eyelights still sparkled. Alphys was still recovering from the earlier enthusiasm.

“Y-you, you re– uh, you really like it?”

“Of course,” he said and reached for the prototype again. “May I?”

Alphys nodded, mute. Gaster played with the machine a little more, even daring to prod pieces.

“No wonder Asgore chose you as my replacement. It was a good decision.”

\---

Gaster was so absorbed in the absolutely fascinating, incomprehensible, distracting technology that he didn’t notice Alphys burying her face in her blanket. He didn’t look up when her shoulders shook.

“I will admit, I was a bit hesitant when I found out. You were just so young, and the job was so stressful… but it’s not like I was around to give my input.” He chuckled, oblivious.

“But your work is incredible. Given a few more years, I’m sure you would have revolutionized life in the underground.”

He only noticed the problem when he diverted his attention to ask a question.

“So… how did you supply fuel to the– oh my God what happened?”

Alphys couldn’t speak. Gaster cradled the prototype to his chest, snatched the tarp away and set both on the table. He scooted even closer and held his hands helplessly at shoulder level.

“Alphys? What did I do?”

“Y-y-y…” Alphys choked and clutched the blanket to her head. When she didn’t elaborate, Gaster patted her shoulder.

“It’s alright. Shh… it’s alright. It’ll be o…k.” The words brought back unpleasant memories, but he shoved them down for now. In response, Alphys sobbed harder.

They sat there for a minute while Alphys calmed down enough to speak. Nervous sweat ran down the back of Gaster’s skull.

*

“Sorry,” Alphys whined. Gaster scrambled for a tissue and handed her the entire box. Rather, he held it while she hid under the blanket.

“Please, don’t be sorry. Just tell me what’s wrong.”

Alphys chuckled. It sounded forced. “Nothing is wr-wrong. You… you’re just so sweet.”

Well, that’s something he’d never been accused of before. Gaster tilted his head in confusion and put his hands in his lap.

“I could never replace y-you…”

“Well, not me as a person, no, but you did well as royal scientist.”

“But I-I messed everything up!” Alphys wailed and peeked up at him from behind the blanket. “I lied about M-Mettaton, and then I stole y-your blueprints, and, and, I hurt the amal- amalg…”

She broke down into more crying. Gaster scooted the rest of the distance and wrapped her in an awkward hug.

“I lied and no-nobody was upset?! I just disappointed everyone! An- and I can’t even do my job _now_!”

Gaster muttered comforting noises as she ranted.

“I have so much I- I need to do, and I haven’t even started! I should be organized, and, and I should have everything done by now, and I… I should be working on my _real_ projects instead of this stupid jetpack! We’re not underground any, anymore, so everything should be good but I’m still so stressed out?! But I have a great job and a great girlfriend and a great house?! I should be getting _better!_ I can’t do any-any- I can’t do anything right! I hate myself!”

“ _Hey,_ stop that.” Gaster pulled away and thunked her on the snout. It surprised her into silence.

“Hating yourself doesn’t fix anything.” The hypocrisy was not lost on him, but chose to ignore it anyway.

She blinked and stuttered something vaguely coherent. “But–!“

“No buts.”

Alphys stared up at him and wiped some of the tears from her eyes. Gaster could tell she wanted to say something.

“Ok, fine, one but.”

“…But... y-you said I… I killed my... And Undyne… and Mettaton…”

Alphys looked away, and Gaster winced.

After taking a moment to kick himself and collect his thoughts, Gaster cleared his nonexistent throat. Alphys glanced back.

“…Alphys, I should not have told you that, but since I did… you need to know everything.”

The paranoid part of him screamed not to talk about the events during resets, to preserve what little timeline integrity remained. The rest of him shrugged it off. How much worse could things get, anyway?

Gaster looked down into his lap while he spoke. “You only did… _that,_ in a few scenarios. Specifically, ones where Undyne and Mettaton were taken from you… In others, you became the Queen of the Underground.”

Alphys’s eye twitched. “Um… what?”

“ When the flower went on a rampage, it killed everyone it could find. It killed Undyne, Mettaton… Papyrus, the dogs, everyone. Undyne put out an evacuation order, and you hid the survivors where the flower couldn’t find you. It said something to Asgore, I don’t know what, and he couldn’t function. He hid the souls, but other than that, he didn’t do much else.”

Gaster looked up from his hands for a moment to make sure Alphys was listening. She was, her glasses a little foggy.

“Once the flower got bored killing everyone, you set up a settlement in the CORE. It had a hard time burrowing through the metal, so it was safer than anywhere else in the underground.”

“The flower reset shortly after, but that doesn’t negate that you stepped up where nobody else would.”

Sans certainly never did. Gaster shoved down the mixed feelings so he could focus on Alphys.

“You saved everyone that was left. You had to let them see the amalgamates, and keep everyone calm.”

Alphys looked… like she was feeling a lot of things. She wasn’t crying, though, so that was good. Gaster patted her shoulder and got her attention again.

He chuckled. “Besides, I would be quite the hypocrite if I blamed you for doing that when your loved ones died.”

Alphys smiled, a strained but genuine one, without trying too hard. “Aww.”

She sniffed and rubbed at her eyes with the edge of the blanket. “That’s... that’s nice I gu-guess.”

The lapsed into silence. Gaster paid close attention to her demeanor, and once she started to sag again, he leaned forward.

“You’re capable of amazing things, Alphys. Let yourself do them.”

Alphys half-nodded, retrieved her prototype and curled farther into the corner of the couch.

*

Well, hoping she’d just stop being sad was admittedly unrealistic. Gaster popped his knuckles while she prodded her prototype, and tried to remember how he used to comfort Sans and Papyrus on the rare occasions they let anything show.

He wasn’t her dad, but he was old enough to be.

“Would you like me to stay and work with you?”

Alphys looked down and dug at the couch cushion with her toes.

“…Yes please.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I liiiiiiive!
> 
> This chapter did not want to be written, but here it is! I was going to agonize over it for another week or so and make countless tiny edits, but you know what? I'm doing this for free! It doesn't have to be perfect! :D
> 
> This was going involve three more major events, but it's getting a little long. Stay posted for hugs and face punches. 
> 
> Also, if it isn't clear, bold text denotes Gaster speaking in Wingdings instead of Arial (or whatever intelligible font I change my mind to later).

**Author's Note:**

> I'm gonna be real: the posting schedule for this is anyone's guess. School and life take priority but I really enjoy this story and have an outline, so I'm more likely to see it through. Hope you enjoy :D


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